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Big day for commercials; Super Bowl important for advertisers, too.; Sure, there will be a football game, but many watch to see the ads.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, February 7, 2010 Sunday
Today, millions of people will gather around their television sets to watch the biggest sporting event of the year. Some will be avid football fanatics, though many will be fair-weather fans tuning in for the first time all season. The reason for the fresh crop of viewers is not the excitement of the game but rather the elaborate, creative and endlessly entertaining commercials that have grown synonymous with the televised Super Bowl experience. The Super Bowl is perhaps the only show on television that would deliver a lower rating if you pulled out all of the commercials.

In rough times, ads get weird, pants come off; Super Bowl XLIV
The San Francisco Chronicle (California), February 8, 2010 Monday
Super Bowl advertisements were a little bit bolder, a lot weirder and definitely featured more pantsless men than previous years. Pantsless men in the workplace. Pantsless men striding purposefully down fields of gold. Pantsless men facing sumo wrestlers. Viewers can draw what they want from that trend, but we're declaring it a metaphor for the economy. The jobless rate is so high, even trousers aren't a guarantee in life anymore. Financial times may be rough, but dozens of advertisers were still willing to pay upward of $3 million for a 30-second spot in Sunday's game between the Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints. A few may have even gotten their money's worth - and not just because they had the luck of an underdog winner in a compelling game. Super Bowl XLIV wasn't an all-time classic year in terms of advertising it's doubtful more than one or two of these commercials will be remembered a year from now, much less in a decade, but there were still plenty of good ads.

Ads less thrilling than game
Chicago Sun Times, February 8, 2010 Monday
Super Bowl advertising this year pushed product more than creativity or the big idea. And the "wow" factor was in short supply, though there was plenty of dumb. Maybe the era of Super Bowl advertising that stands the test of time is over for good. We probably won't know for sure until the great recession is fully behind us. TOUCHDOWNS Beaver: Job search site Monster.com knows millions of Americans are looking for work, and it wants to help. And the site hopes its fiddling beaver, who makes his debut in this Super Bowl spot, will help everyone remember Monster.com. BBDO/New York has done an excellent job of storytelling here. The saga of the beaver's journey to Carnegie Hall doesn't have a lot to do with Monster.com per se, but it's a memorable, entertaining piece of work. And that's important in a cluttered Super Bowl advertising environment.

Cahill kicks off on TV; Gov hopeful shows game plan in Super Bowl ad
The Boston Herald, February 8, 2010 Monday
State Treasurer Timothy Cahill touted his South Shore hustle and independent streak in his first gubernatorial advertisement - a 15-second $20,000 Super Bowl ad meant to be an election-year game-changer.

SUPER BOWL XLIV; Pants-free ads, Google earn Super Bowl wins
The Boston Herald, February 8, 2010 Monday
Google's ad was the best of the Super Bowl bunch, according to a panel of advertising experts. ``It's what great advertising should be,'' said Gary Greenberg, the executive vice president and chief creative officer at Allen & Gerritson. ``I couldn't wait to see the story unfold.''

Focus on the Family leaves Super Bowl happy; Ad was no crowd-pleaser, but it certainly got noticed
USA TODAY, February 9, 2010 Tuesday
Suddenly, the focus is off the family -- and on the data. One day after the evangelical group Focus on the Family aired its Super Bowl commercial -- following a storm of controversy -- it was clear on Monday that the group achieved its goal: a torrent of new attention for its website and its brand in social media land. "Our website is crashing," jokes Jim Daly, president and CEO of Focus on the Family. In fact, it would have crashed had the group not beefed up its servers in anticipation. After the ad aired, the site's traffic ballooned to 40 times its normal volume -- with 50,000 unique visitors and 500,000 hits.

Move over, 'M*A*S*H'; Super battle pushes aside legendary TV series' finale as most viewed show ever
Chicago Sun Times, February 9, 2010 Tuesday
The 2010 Super Bowl on CBS will go down as the most-watched TV show in history. The Nielsen Co., which crunches data for the TV industry, said 106.5 million viewers tuned into football's biggest game Sunday -- a total that surpassed the previous record audience of 105. 97 million for the 1983 finale of "M*A*S*H." The national Nielsen rating for the Indianapolis vs. New Orleans matchup was a 46.4. Viewership has been growing the past few years and hasn't depended on the teams' market size. And this year's game had the draw of Indianapolis quarterback Peyton Manning seeking his second Super Bowl ring and the story line of New Orleans' recovery from Hurricane Katrina. (Even

In-store marketing: Get to the point
Retail Week, February 5, 2010 Friday
Retailers are increasingly in favour of decluttering stores, so what's the future for in-store marketing? In the region of £1.5bn is spent on in-store marketing in the UK and Ireland each year. It's a staggering sum, but some argue that brand promotions at the shelf have had their day. Asda has been open about its policy of decluttering its stores; and it's also not the only retailer to be favouring own-label products more within its rationalised ranges. FMCGs express frustration at finding it harder to get their promotions into stores, and at the same time are turning to alternative routes to market for their brand messaging and education, such as the internet. Meanwhile, retailers are increasingly tailoring and personalising promotions, and using customer data captured from loyalty schemes and online sales to target particular shoppers with offers.

Harold Washington rips Quinn from grave in Hynes ad
Chicago Sun Times, January 22, 2010 Friday
"Who are you gonna believe, me, or your lying eyes?" Richard Pryor coined that phrase, but it has become Gov. Quinn's stock reaction to his opponent's campaign ads. After being hammered by Comptroller Dan Hynes for secretly releasing hundreds of dangerous felons from prison early, Quinn ran a response TV ad claiming that Hynes had "grossly" distorted his record. The "truth," Quinn's ad claimed, was that Quinn wanted to move nonviolent offenders into halfway homes -- as if the widely condemned early release program never even existed.

BILLBOARD MISTRESS WAS DUPED - KIN; EXEC'S FALSE ADVERTISING
The New York Post, January 23, 2010 Saturday
It wasn't his mistress that tech titan Charles Phillips was keeping secret - it was his wife! YaVaughnie Wilkins - the Oracle president's gal pal who plastered billboard ads across the country to declare their love - lived with him for years before discovering he still had a relationship with his wife, relatives said yesterday.

nbc, affiliates begin to make up
WALL STREET JOURNAL ABSTRACTS, January 25, 2010 Monday

advertising: hopefuls gird for gridiron
WALL STREET JOURNAL ABSTRACTS, January 25, 2010 Monday

Wireless rivals in epic battle; AT&T, Verizon pump total of $4 billion into ads to tout networks.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, January 19, 2010 Tuesday
It's a war for the ages, and Atlanta is on the front lines the way it was when hometown giant Coca-Cola battled Pepsi in the cola wars of the 1980s and 1990s. But the firepower in that war --- mere hundreds of millions of dollars a year --- pales in comparison to the money and resources Atlanta-based AT&T Mobility and archrival Verizon Wireless are pouring into the cellphone wars. In the year just ended the companies spent a combined $4 billion --- that's billion --- to wallpaper American living rooms with an astounding 615,000 TV commercials as they battled for supremacy in the estimated $150 billion U.S. wireless market.

TV ad man drops (nearly) everything for Haiti spot
THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS, January 20, 2010 Wednesday
When TV commercial director Rocky Powell got a call last Thursday to drop everything and fly to LA for a shoot, he figured it was something big. All the movie stars in the empyrean were gathering for the Golden Globes and they were all saying the same thing: "Haiti."

How I Did It: Aflac's CEO Explains How He Fell for the Duck
HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW, January 2010 - February 2010
The Aflac Duck is a rock star in Japan. That's the only way I can describe how big he has become there. In a down economy, Aflac Japan's sales increased by 12% in 2003, the year we introduced the duck. Today we insure one out of every four Japanese households and are the leading insurance company measured by number of policies in force. We took that title from Nippon Life, which had held it for more than 100 years. In 2009 our Japanese marketing team introduced a new incarnation of the duck for a new insurance product. It's a mix of our duck and the traditional Asian good-luck white cat, Maneki Neko. The cat duck has become so popular that our newest commercial was voted number one in Japan. A giant plush version of Maneki Neko Duck toured the country by bus, drawing crowds as big as 20,000 in city after city. At each event we set up tables where we were able to sell policies to enthusiastic fans.Incarnations of Aflac's Branding Mascot U.S. commercial clip

Rethinking Marketing
HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW, January 2010 - February 2010
ABOVE Michel de Broin,Encircling,2006, Asphalt, yellow paint, road sign, 14.8 x 21.9 m, Scape Biennale, Christchurch, New Zealand Imagine a brand manager sitting in his office developing a marketing strategy for his company's new sports drink. He identifies which broad market segments to target, sets prices and promotions, and plans mass media communications. The brand's performance will be measured by aggregate sales and profitability, and his pay and future prospects will hinge on those numbers.

New marketing director for Asos
Retail Week, January 19, 2010 Tuesday
Online fashion retailer Asos has appointed a new marketing director to help grow the business as an international brand. Clare Dobbie has a breadth of experience with several international companies including Gap, French Connections and Nike. She worked on marketing for Gap in Europe both setting up its marketing team and working on the launch of its Banana Republic fascia in London.

SUPER BOWL'S ADS SACKED BY ECONOMY
The New York Post, January 12, 2010 Tuesday
Even the Super Bowl is taking a hit from the down economy. The big game is still the most expensive time on television, with the cost of a single spot quadrupling in the past 20 years, but the average cost of a Super Bowl spot is expected to be down this year compared to last, according to new figures from TNS Media.

callaway tees up in india, signs golfer singh as sport tees off
WALL STREET JOURNAL ABSTRACTS, January 13, 2010 Wednesday

America Online, But Not On AOL; Online Pioneer Shifts, Struggles "Worst Fundamentals' One-time giant attempts to revive fortunes with fresh content, cost cuts
Investor's Business Daily, January 13, 2010 Wednesday
AOL's long-troubled marriage with Time Warner is over, but investors looking for the former online-access giant to thrive on its own might be in for a long wait. "This is a boat with a lot of leaks in it. It's a deteriorating asset," said Citibank Global Markets analyst Mark Mahaney, who has a "neutral" rating on the company. "I think it will take 12 to 24 months to know whether management can turn it around." Though no longer the online access giant it was in the 1990 s, the company's Web portal remains one of the largest in the U.S., and the company generates millions of dollars in online advertising through a wide network of topic-focused blogs and other content sites.

Domino's comes clean with new pizza ads
Pittsburgh Tribune Review, January 13, 2010 Wednesday
For a pizza joint, it's a bold move to tell customers your crust tasted like cardboard and your sauce was like ketchup.

Investor's Business Daily
January 14, 2010 Thursday
BAIDU INC ADS (BIDU)Grp 108 o$439.48 20.9 M Shares98 Comp. Rating98 EPSRS 92 ROE 45% CHINESE PROVIDER OF INTERNET SEARCH, TARGETED ONLINE ADVERTISING AND OTHER INTERNET CONTENT SERVICES.

Does Google's Tough Talk Give China Wiggle Room? Analysts Say Deal Possible Despite censorship issue, search giant may deem market too big to ignore
Investor's Business Daily, January 14, 2010 Thursday
Google says it's mad as hell and won't take it any more, but analysts expect the tech giant will find a way to keep working with China's government rather than give up a piece of the country's multibillion-dollar ad market In a blog post late Tuesday, the Web's leading search service said it began mulling the idea of pulling up stakes in the country after it found that December cyberattacks on its system in China were launched to access Google e-mail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.